The growing up days of Mr.S

There are some people whom we watch growing up in front of us and it feels great to know that they have excelled in life and are doing good in thier own chosen fields...This is exactly how i felt today when I came to know about Mr.S and how well he got himself placed after his engineering degree.He had a childhood which is worth mentioning and when I recollect his childhood it only makes me think and smile that he too has finally grown up managing himself in this wicked world full with blood suckers...

He had the most protective childhood I have ever seen or probably others might have had similar childhood days but I was not fortunate to see them all.His existence on this planet it seemed depended on two glass full of milk once in the morning and again in the evening which his mom dutifully never forgot to serve...He was the only son being preceded by an elder sister and thats the reason of so much care and protection from his parents.The level of protection can be imagined from the fact that his maid was asked to accompany him while he was relieving himself in between studies(this at the age of 10+ years).....

But despite such environment at home Mr.S always dreamt of being a part of the main stream and tried his best to catch up with his contemporaries sometimes even bribing them to play within the protection of his own compound...These bribes were mostly to allow them the luxury of playing with his stuff..(what I mean here his cricket bat, or the new "Kickshaw" football..not anything else that may come to your mind)..

He also had this habbit where anything that you would have said to him he would make a funny sound before responding ...something like "haaaw".It so felt that either he was short of hearing or he lacked the basic level of intelligence expected from a kid of his age...

Mr.S also acted as the famous mythological character of "Narad Muni" always ready to add spices to every incident and floating them at the wrong place and more importantly at the wrong time..I will here narrate one particular incident to support this. I had an argument with someone while we were playing cricket after school and Mr.S happened to be the witness by pure chance as his group of kids were too playing nearby. I usually never carried such things back home as they were meant to be solved by me without getting my family involved in such silly matters. That very evening Mr.S and his family paid us a visit as it was just after the Durga Pujas, and it was common for Bengalis to become extra social during those days.Everything went on fine and they were ready to leave after devouring platefull of sweets prepared by my mom.While leaving Mr.S suddenly asked me about the incident and in such a manner-"Today you had an argument while playing na?"...I was dumbstruck as he spilled the beans out in front of everyone and without any reason or provocation...I wish I could twist his ears at that precise moment but the courtesy of playing host overpowered my emotions.Such was Mr.S and this happened many times in so many ocassions that the count would be infinity.I was not the only victim of his though but almost everyone tasted this atlest once if not more.

Mr.S also was a copy cat of the first order...I had the facination for caps and till date cant resist if I see a good one.If you exercise your grey cells a little and try to recollect am sure many would remember the cap that Aamir Khan wore in "Dil Hai Ki Manta Nahin"...The cap was an instant hit and I was the proud owner of one or so I felt.Mr.S was hardly 6 or 7 years then but as soon as he saw the cap gave a wicked smile and started asking questions like where did I buy it from etc...I knew what was in store and true to my assumptions I saw him wearing the same cap and waving at me from the balcony..He had a sense of triumph in his gestures that day a but he crossed the limit of irritating me when he later asked in the same trademark stupid way "I also have it now na"?...

He plans to vist me soon as he's now somewhere near Delhi...This time I am eager to meet him and see his transformation from a timid little boy to a well settled professional who has just embarked on his professional journey...All the best Mr.S!!

Curfew Days..

Well curfew is something which is not common to most atlest not to those who have never stayed in a troubled area...I incedentally happend to grow up in a place where this particular situation was pretty common thanks to the ever agitating local student body..But instead of complaining about it or even trying to understand the gravity of the situation I quiet enjoyed such brief stints atleast couple of times in a year as this meant a break from school and days where u could use the road as your own backyard...I am sure many of my chilhood friends will agree to this..and apart form indulging ourselves in watching movies (ya those were the days of VCRs and VCPs whre we used to run those bulky VHS cassettes) it was time for some serious and competitive gully cricket...I dont know how many people have cursed us for ruining thier afternoon siesta after a stumpous meal of maach bhaat (fish curry and rice for my non bengali readers)...and Rupak am sure will the leader of all of them in cursing us.The poor chap is not to be blamed as our sole aim in life was to make the ball land on his tin roof which invariably disturbed his sleep and god knows what else:-)

Actually the strip of cemented road that we palyed on was just adjacent to his house...On one side of the road was a small hillock with bushes and a dirty drain to add to the beauty and on the other side or rather the off side of the pitch was Mr. Rupak's abode called "Shiv Dham"...

Whenever the curfew was relaxed for few hours to allow people to buy their essentials we would end up stocking up balls as we were not sure when the next relaxation would happen...and safe gaurding the balls were our prime concern where else our parents were worried stocking up rice,pulses,vegetables etc..A typical day on such ocassion will start at around 11 when evryone would slowly start assembling...The 1st half of the day was till about 2pm and the 2nd half would again start at 3:30 giving enough time to each one to bathe and take their lunch...Every tom dick and harry would come and try their skills...Pinak would endlessly try his "Chimpa kali" a term which was given to a peculier way of spin bowling twisting the arm while in the process of delivery...and Devraj would run like a mad bull to increase the pace of his bowling sumtimes distracting the batsman as in the process of running his assets kept bouncing (result of too much gyming and then taking a break..) Kalan even suggested him to wear a b** to stop distracting the batsman:-)

But who can forget the heroics of Bappan Da (da is a suffix used for elder brothers in bengali)..On one ocassion while batting he suddenly threw the bat aside and took out a home made dagger instead pointing it towards the incoming delivery..and as luck would have it it headed straight towards the dagger in the process piercing itself and making us all devoid of any further play...Yes that was the last ball saved from the stock....For many curfew was an unpleasant experience and days filled with tension but for us we cared the least as long as we could end up playing with the road all to ourselves and Rupak too ready to be tormented and robbed of his peace.....

Preparation for CWG but at what cost??

Yesterday had a reunion of sort with all my contemporary DME's at NIIT....The ocassion was to catch up with evryone as Jaideep our first team leader at NIIT was on a trip back home from China...Was indeed great to catch up those days when we just started our career...
While returning back from CP where we all met I got stuck up in a massive traffic jam...Almost took 30 mins to negotiate the outer circle and reach KG Marg..The point here is wherever I was looking out from my friends car could only see construction happening on some pretext or the other with big iron boards scattered on the road to proudly proclaim "CWG Games".....CP has been a nightmare for commuters in peak hours just because of mindless planning and implementation of development work in the name of CWG..
A question comes to my mind do we need such kind of games in every city of our vast country to develop the infrastructure??Or could we even start doing it otherwise...But sadly the answer seems NO..But this fast paced development is coming at what cost that too needs to be given a thought...Just the other day read an article where delhi govt. has asked all the beggers and other homeles people to be removed from the streets of delhi not giving them any alternative...A heartless act was the removal of the night shelters by MCD in the peak of one of the worst winters experienced by Delhi...
Have we learnt all these from China who took similar steps before the Olympics??Even the saftey measures of each of the projects like Delhi Metro or Flyovers have been compromised just to meet the deadlines.We have seen the adverse results of these already in the mishaps at the Metro site in south delhi....
Good that we are developing rapidly and trying to catch up with the world or project ourselves as a world class city but its also time to introspect and ask ourselves "At What Cost?"

First Blog as an Blogger!!

I welcome myself to the ever growing world of e-bloggers...Well dont know wht promted me to start blogging but I always loved expressing my thoughts through the medium of writing than depending on the verval mode...But as time does'nt permit to pen them down thru "pen and paper" so here I am introducing my self to blogging...

Well to start with let me share a very funny incident that happened exactly two days ago...I was travelling from Lajpat Nagar to Kamla Nagar to attend my office. I had time in my hand and suddenly fancied the idea of trying the DTC after ages...To my surprise the staff (driver and conductor) were both very young something very rare in DTC...Probably another gimmic of Mrs. Dixit before the much hyped Common Wealth Games...But i cudnt care much as long as they drove well...I decided to get down at the Central Secrateriat Stop to catch the metro to further my journey to Kamla Nagar...By then I also realised that the dirver had no idea of the routes to follow and kept shouting at the conductor to tell him the right and left turns well in advance so that we passengers cud reach our exact destination :-)...To top all this the conductor himself asked passengers the fare rates as he declared too proudly that he was new in this job..That was not all though...My intention to share this is because I myself directed the driver from G-Block to Central Secretiriat Bus Stop showing him the right and left turns myself...

Never ever imagined that will have to give direction to a DTC bus driver to reach my destination....

As they say "It all happens in Delhi" !!!